her she was writhing in the dirt. Still, her eyes were open, and she watched in horror as the screaming sphere broke apart completely, becoming a black cloud of glittering particles. A cloud that was growing.
“Miranda,” Eli said, his voice cutting cleanly through the panic. She barely felt his hands as he grabbed her shoulders and dragged her to her feet, but his voice was clear and commanding. Somewhere in her garbled mind, she realized that he was speaking to her like she was a spirit. “Leave right now.”
He let her go, and she nearly toppled over. Only Gin’s cold nose pressed into her back kept her from falling.
“He’s right,” the hound whined, ears flat. “That thing is insane. We leave now.”
Miranda opened her mouth to protest, but Gin didn’t give her a chance. He ran for the forest with Miranda clutched like a pup between his teeth and the still-unconscious king bouncing on his back. Miranda was screaming something about Eli, but the hound didn’t stop, and he never once looked back.
As soon as the ghosthound disappeared into the woods, Eli turned and ran as hard as he could in the other direction, nearly colliding with Josef and Nico.
“What are you doing?” Eli yelled, grabbing them both. “I told you to get to the boulder!” He did a double take when he saw the bloodstain across most of Josef’s shirt. “What happened to you?”
“Never mind that!” Josef shouted. “Where’s the gold?”
“I’ll explain later!” Eli shouted back, yanking them both toward the rock at the clearing’s edge. “Just run!”
Josef nodded and started running. If the situation was serious enough for Eli to abandon cash, then this was not the time to argue. They tore across the clearing, ignoring the growing roar behind them. Even Josef could hear it now, a high-pitched screaming that rubbed his nerves raw. It was like an injured child’s scream, but there was nothing human in this sound and it did not stop for breath. Josef shuddered and kept running.
Eli was shouting at the rock even before they reached the clearing’s edge. However, the rock didn’t seem to be answering, because Eli slid to a halt just in front of it and started to gesture frantically as a dark shadow fell across them.
Josef whirled around, grabbing one of his remaining knives just so he didn’t have to face whatever it was empty-handed. But even a blade in his hand didn’t make him feel better when he saw what was behind them. Across the clearing, an enormous tower of black cloud loomed over the blasted ground where Renaud had been standing only moments ago. Billows of dark dust, black and glistening like volcanic glass, spun impossibly fast in the windless sky, rising in great swirls that blotted out the sun. As if it had been waiting for him to turn around, the cloud’s wailing reached a frantic pitch, and it began to move forward.
“Eli,” Josef said over his shoulder, “whatever you’re doing, could you do it a little faster?”
Eli gave him a biting look before turning back to the boulder. Josef backed up a step, pressing Nico into the stone. The cloud was not heading at them directly. Instead, it skirted the edge of the clearing, keeping close to the forest. The trees leaned back when the billowing black dust came near, lifting their branches high in the air, as if they were trying to get out of its way. Then the screaming storm touched a tree that had the misfortune of growing too far out, and Josef saw why. As soon as the spinning black gusts connected with the branches, they disintegrated. The cyclone passed over the tree as if it were not there, reducing it to sawdust without effort or notice, and without slowing its progress toward the huddled group by the boulder.
“Eli,” Josef said again, “now would be good.”
“Got it!” Eli shouted. “All right, go!”
“Go where?!” Josef yelled frantically. The cloud was almost on top of them, filling his vision from ground to sky. That was the last thing he saw before the rock swallowed him.
CHAPTER 14
Miranda didn’t realize she had passed out until she woke up sore, stiff, dirty, and uncomfortably damp. She was propped on Gin’s paw, and as soon as she moved, his long snout filled her vision.
“How are you feeling?”
Miranda thought about it, and winced. “Like someone’s beaten me, eaten me, and thrown me up again.”
She ignored his disgusted look and pulled herself up by his fur. “That went well,”